Willow
I trudged through the last hour of school and biked home to an empty house. My parents were due back in a few days. I loathed how my dad would come back to the news of the explosion and have even more ammunition to hate Isaac.
I flopped on our couch, ordered a pizza and flipped on the news. All the local channels were covering the fire. I watched yesterday’s footage of a blazing inferno set against the night sky. The scene then changed to sometime this afternoon, Wexx executives milling around the blasted, blackened shell that used to be one of their stations.
The reporter, a pretty brunette, interviewed a Wexx executive who said the Pearce franchise had been “problematic” for a long time, and the company wasn’t ruling out arson.
I shut the TV off, disgusted, and checked my phone for a text from Isaac. Nothing. He was going silent again, which was his version of little black X’s.
I shot him a text: How is your dad? How are you?
No answer. The message remained ‘delivered’ but not ‘read’ no matter how long I stared.
I curled up on the couch, ate some pizza, and waited. I dozed fitfully and woke up to an incoming text. The clock said it was 11:36 p.m.
He’s still in ICU, Isaac wrote. I’m tired. Wexx people here for hours.
A pause, then a new message: It’s bad.
Come over, I wrote.
Your parents would love that.
They’re out of town until tomorrow night.
I don’t think it’s a good idea.
Why not?
You know why not.
Just to sleep.
I want to, he wrote back.
I don’t want you to be alone tonight.
Another long pause, and then, OK.
A knock came at my back porch twenty minutes later. I deactivated our alarm system and opened the French doors. Isaac stood there, hunched over, hands jammed into the pockets of his hoodie. Looking so young, my heart ached. It was easy to forget he was only nineteen.
“I parked on the street behind this one,” he said. “No one will see.”
My heart ached at that too. Another slap to his face, to the shame he carried through no fault of his own. I opened the door wider to let him step inside. He looked like a thief in a diamond store. His gaze darted all around, certain my parents would jump out and catch him.
“You have a nice house,” he said, as I led him through the kitchen to the family living room. His gaze roamed around once more, then came back to me. Some of the tension slid out of his shoulders as he took in my short pajama shorts and baseball-style sleep-shirt, white with pink sleeves.
“I shouldn’t have come.”
I didn’t say anything but took hold of him by the front of his hoodie and pulled him to me. He wrapped his arms around me and we held each other for a long time.
“I needed this,” he said finally. “You.”
“Are you hungry?” I asked against his chest. “I have pizza.”
He shook his head. I followed his gaze to the fireplace mantel and a service award my dad had received: a large glass Wexx symbol.
“I should go,” he said.
And I should have let him.
“Stay,” I said. “Talk to me. What happened with the Wexx people?”
Isaac hesitated, then slumped on the couch and rubbed his eyes.
“They gave me the ‘big picture,’” he said. “My dad hadn’t been paying royalties on the logo, and he was in debt up to his ass with the gas supplier. But I already knew that. What I didn’t know was how much he owed in back taxes. There’s a lien on the property. And because of the nature of the explosion, they suspect arson. Some kind of fraud, I guess, or willful negligence. What kind of person tries to commit fraud by blowing up his business when he’s standing right in the middle of it?”
“You said you don’t think it was an accident?”
“I don’t know that he did it on purpose, but if he did, it wasn’t to get out of debt. It was to get out of living.”
I pulled Isaac to me and pressed my lips to his chin. “I’ll talk to my dad. He has to help you.”
“Willow…”
“I know, but I have to try. I can’t let you take all of this on. It’s too much.”
“What will be the price I pay for his help? I can tell you right now, it’s you. You’ll be the price I pay.” He shook his head slowly back-and-forth. “It’s too much. I can’t lose you on top of everything else.”
“What are we going to do?”
“I don’t know,” he said. “I’m so tired.”
I stood up and took him by the hand. I led him through my big, beautiful, cold house. Upstairs to my room, where his eyes immediately found the bundle of blankets on the floor.
“It’s not the same bed where it happened,” I said, “but I still can’t sleep in it. I was thinking maybe I could give it a try with you.”
Isaac nodded. He stripped down to his undershirt and boxers while I hauled my blankets up onto the queen-size bed. Isaac helped me smooth out the sheets and comforter, and then we climbed in together.
We lay curled on our sides, facing each other, our fingers intertwined, our legs tangled.
“I’m going to have to go away for a while,” he said. “Probably longer than I thought. Seems so naïve to think I’d hit the jackpot right out of the gate, and make millions of dollars to fix everything.”
“It could happen,” I told him. “You’re amazing, Isaac.”
“So are you.”
I shook my head against the pillow. “Not the same. Your talent is on a different level. It’s like you cast a spell, tricking us into believing we’re somewhere else. That’s a gift. Sometimes people need a break from their own lives. You give that to them.”
“That’s why I do it,” he said tiredly. “To get a break from my own life. Except for right now. With you.”
I smiled, stroked his cheek, brushed the backs of my fingers across his stubble.
“You’re going to be a star. It might not happen right away but it will happen. And I’ll wait for you. However long it takes.”
Isaac’s eyes fell shut as if he were in pain. He kissed me. “Willow,” he said, like a prayer or wish. He pulled me into the protective ring of his embrace, and we slept.
I dreamt of fire. A candle in the dark, a little light clinging to its wick. As I watched, the light grew and stretched—blue to orange to white—wavering but tall and strong.
And then it exploded in a fiery ball, hot and blinding.
I sat up gasping.
Just a bad dream, I thought.
But not a night terror. I could breathe. I was with Isaac.
I looked down at him. He was so beautiful in sleep, his brow smooth and untroubled. His lashes lay against his cheek, and I traced the line of them. The angular cut of his cheekbone, the hard line of his jaw under rough stubble. His full lips that had touched places I thought no man could touch again.
I thought I was lost, but he brought me back. He allowed me to find my way back to myself.
“Isaac,” I whispered.
“Mm.”
“I need to tell you something.”
He opened his eyes slowly. “Hmm?”
“I’m sorry to wake you but it’s important.”
“What do you need to tell me, baby?”
I drew in a breath and let it out. “I love you. I’m in love with you.”
His eyes focused. “Willow…”
“I love you. So much. You don’t have to say it back but—”
“I love you too,” he said. “I’ve been saying it for weeks with someone else’s words.”
“You do?”
“Yeay, baby. I do.”
My chest felt warm and tears blurred my vision. “Say it again,” I whispered.
“I love you,” he said. “So much.” His hand slipped behind my neck and he brought my lips to his. Kissed me softly, then deeper. “I’m glad you woke me up. There’s something I wanted to tell you, too.”
“Better than ‘I love you’?”
“I hope so. I wanted to tell you… I started to tell you at the theater the other day but I ran out of time.” He smiled a little. “I got too busy with other things.”
“Other things were worth it.”
“But I wanted you to know that whatever life you want, that’s the life I want to give you. If you want to live in Harmony, I’ll live in Harmony. It won’t be the torture I always thought it would be. With you, I see it differently. I’m going to go and do something with my acting, to make you proud. To be worthy of you.”
I put my fingertips to his cheek, to the scar where his father had hit him. “You’d really stay here for me?”
“For us,” he said. “I want to do whatever it takes to make you happy. And besides, I hated the idea of leaving Martin and Brenda anyway. And not seeing Benny graduate.”
“It might not be forever,” I said. “I just want a little bit of quiet for a little while. I want to heal first. Here.”
He brushed the hair back from my face. “I want that for you too. More than anything. I love you, Willow.”
“I love you, Isaac,” I said.
We kissed until a small laugh burst from me, and I smiled against his lips.
“What’s so funny?”
“Nothing. Just happy.”
“Me too.”
I kissed him again and just as I settled my head against his chest to sleep, I heard it. A car coming down the quiet street. Isaac froze beneath me, his heart thumping in my ear. We listened as the car drew nearer, slowed, and the crunch of tires rolling into our driveway.
“Oh, God,” I breathed, tossing the covers off. “My parents.”